@richabr posted:It would have been a horrible decision for Gilbert to produce this set. A too limited appeal and lack of dual service for play value would have been a sales disaster. An RS design was likely too narrow for the drive used at the time. More likely candidates might have been a Trainmaster, RDC, Alco DL600 or a low nosed GE or GM unit. All were capable of using the diesel drive of the time and could have been made in various roadnames.
The RSD-7 wouldn't have been that bad a choice. Gilbert did the GP7 after all. It would've been the same basic design: PA motor block under the cab, non-powered truck under the long hood. Just add different sideframes. It wouldn't have looked any worse than the stretched Blomberg sideframes the GP7 used.
Three roads along bought the RSD-7, with the Alco Demonstrators, all marketable in the 50's: Santa Fe, C&O and Pennsy.
And they could have "stretched the truth" and toss in roads that bought the externally similar RSD-15: DM&IR, Cotton Belt and Southern Pacific. After all, how many prototype Santa Fe blue and yellow freight PA's were there?
Rusty
